Hong Kong Young Writers Anthologies Winners 2020 | Page 48

Winning Entries
but grandpa joseph
grandpa joseph what do you mean
we don’t have trees
we have trees
why they’re right outside our window
if you didn’t have such bad eyesight
maybe you could see them!
here let me help you
polish your glasses lens
what do you mean by we don’t have trees
when there’s BARK-1, CEDAR-2, YEW-3…
there’s even a rare subspecies BAOBAB-8-4-7
right next to school!
ha!
have you ever climbed
those trees? caressed them with
tenderness and felt its heart beat?
those trees are inklings of what real
trees were:  big, strong, mighty…
baobabs are native to
botswana, dear child, they don’t
belong here anymore than the
himalayan cedars or
the english yew
why has society yearned
for globalisation so intensely that
we’ve exchanged even our trees!
only the very lungs of this planet
that combat all the pollutants we
pump into this fragile, failing
ecosystem. look closely, my love,
and you’ll see these trees are dying.
they’re dying because they weren’t
made to be thousands of kilometres
away from their birthplace. they’re
dying because we’re killing them
and ourselves along with them.
what do you mean!
we live in the greater bay area
life has never been greater
oh honey
but you see that thin veil of grey,
shielding the sun from what would
otherwise be a brilliant hot glare that
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